Tuesday, August 31, 2010

Back from vacation. Unfortunately into back to school craziness. School starts tomorrow for the biggies, and as usual, our district has messed up our bus schedule. Grrr.

I'm trying to stay calm by thinking back to the lovely holiday we had at the Outer Banks. Here is a photo recap. (Beware, lots of bad photos taken with my point and shoot. Note to self: get another point and shoot.)

On our way down to the shore, we took a wrong turn somewhere, and drove down the entire length of Delaware's coast. Thank goodness it's a small state. But oh happiness, when (once back on track) we passed by Grave Digger's garage and tourist trap! The littlest is a huge fan of monster trucks, and he was pretty dang excited to see some in real life. Yes, we are evil parents and have never taken him to a real monster truck show.

The back of our little rental just happened to be where the wild mustangs like to roam. So we got to see them from our balconies on a daily basis. Super cute, since one of them had a two week old baby. Super yuck, since they poop all around the perimeter of the house. Sometimes under the house in the bbq/parking spot. Barefooting to the beach was not recommended.

This particular body of water was also a huge attraction to people with rental Jeeps. We saw lots of people drive through it, hooting and hollering like they were on horseback in the Old West, only to have their engine die on the other side. Yeah. We pitied those fools.

For one week, life was a beach. We made sand structures (not sure those were castles), watched the tide go up and down, flew a kite, swam, grilled and ate lots of food, had some beer (alas, not me), tried to capture a sandpiper for pet, collected lots of shells, watched dolphins do dolphiny tricks, and started a clam kingdom.

We also ventured out for my birthday (ate an amazing lobster roll), visited the Wright Brother's museum (kinda lame), and the Roanoke Lost Colony site (even lamer), but hey, at least I got to take a photo of Dirty Dick's. Their billboard reads, "I got my crabs from Dirty Dick's." Needless to say, we didn't stop to eat there.

On the way back to Philly, I made Bryan stop at every Staple's and Office Depot to search for those Sharpie pencils. No luck. Four states and nothing. Bah. But hey, at least we didn't get crabs from Dirty Dick's. (Sorry, I had to write that one more time. Did I mention that we also passed by The Big Pecker and Crabby Dick's restaurants? I don't know who named these places, but I think they need help being a bit more creative, and bit less descriptive.)

On that lovely note, I'm doing a giveaway tomorrow (it's a very awesome book from Ella)! See you then.

Friday, August 20, 2010

It started with the brothers getting a lecture from parents about being super nice to the little dude. And I have to say, they were really nice all day long. Made me proud.

Littlest came downstairs to find the house strung with hearts and dots (in his favorite colors). He was pretty impressed, but wondered where the chocolate cake was.

Luckily, he got distracted by playing video games with his brothers. (Yes, oldest is wearing stripes and plaid. He thinks they look good together, regardless of what I keep telling him.)

Then, a nice lunch of pasta carbonara (Dad's specialty). The rest of us had some salad also, but birthday boy was having none of it. And he was excused, this being his special day and all.

Then off to the Lego store. Apparently, parents are not to be trusted with purchasing of presents. He wanted to be around to supervise.

Oh look, it's Lego Boba Fett.

There was also a stop at Best Buy to get Lego Harry Potter for the Nintendo DS. Have you detected a Lego obsession yet?

Then home, where mac 'n' cheese (with four cheeses and a crunchy top, mind you) was made and eaten. Sorry, no photos.

Then the big boys surprised him with more (guess!) Legos!

That thing he is wearing on his head? Not a party hat. It was a paper cone filled with little presents. It was hung on his doorknob. That's why his name is upside down. But his brothers forced it onto his head. Oh well.

And finally, the cake! It didn't look all that nice, but it was divine. Trust me. I don't even like chocolate (please no heckling), and I loved this cake.

He said something about being his birthday, therefore it was OK for him to touch the cake. Uh-huh. And yes, I did indeed make a template with his name and polka dots (yeah, Quicktuz and punches!).

We finished off the day with some loving from the parentals. I think he was pretty happy with the way things turned out.

Friday, August 13, 2010

Hey! I've posted a tutorial at the Mosh Posh blog for my stitched camera. It's ridiculous easy, so y'all will probably be shaking your heads going, "Eh? That was it?"

And because I couldn't possibly have drawn a camera and not shared, you can download your own copy here.

I'll be spending my weekend celebrating the littlest's 5th birthday. I can't believe he's going to be five. He has informed me that he'd like a chocolate cake that is all chocolate (he said, "chocolate on top, chocolate on the bottom, and chocolate on the sides. Made with chocolate."). When I asked him what else he wanted to eat, he said, "I did say chocolate cake already." OK then. Chocolate cake.

Monday, August 9, 2010

Truth is, I woke up kinda cranky. But that's my fault for going to sleep super late last night, staying up to knit while watching HBO (ohmigosh, True Blood is amazing this season! Can that teeny town have any more supernatural creatures? My town is so boring. Just yoga moms like me. Meh.)

I spent the weekend scrapbooking and cooking (therefore eating). So that was pretty dang good. I'm currently working on my middlest's elementary school directory. I'm pretty sure I'm not the only graphic designer parent in that school. But I might be the only parent who's fessed up to being a graphic designer. Therefore, anything that might be considered "design-y" gets pushed my way. Yearbooks, fair logos, fund raising calendars, slide shows. My talent never ceases to amaze me. (I'm being sarcastic here, by the way.)

So. In order to stop my whining, and to cheer me up, here is something I made this weekend.

I had gone to the store to buy some fresh mozzarella, but I was distracted (as usual, ayi!) and ended up with burrata. Burrata is fresh mozzarella filled with slightly whipped heavy cream. Hellooo!?!? Can this thing be any more caloric? I prepped it the same way I'd do a tomato and mozzarella salad. And dang, that extra creamy cheese made this dish so much yummier than the usual recipe. So thank you Mario Batali for teaching me about burrata. Orange is my favorite color too.

Friday, August 6, 2010

I'm sitting here, trying to decide if I should go out for my run now or later. This is a ridiculous daily non-Jedi mind trick that I use to convince myself that there is a perfect time to go running (and that if I go during that perfect time, the run will be perfect.) Being that it's a non-Jedi trick, it doesn't work. There is no perfect time. The perfect time is afterwards. When I'm done, and guzzling a giant bottle of iced water.

While I'm pondering on that, I thought I'd share my layouts using Mosh Posh's August kit. It was filled with Sassafras (which I love) and Lily Bee (which I also love). Win-win.

These photos just crack me up. This is my youngest who is under the impression that it's OK to wear plaid on plaid. I tried explaining to him that this particular getup had too much of a good thing. But he retorted that it matched just fine, being that both articles of clothing were orange-based. Makes sense, I guess.

I love the photos on this page. Last summer, while my mom was visiting, we went out to the front yard after dinner, with bikes and scooters and just goofed around. My mom got on a bike for the first time in over 40 years! And she proved that it's true that you never forget how to ride a bike. Although she was screaming. In a (scared) happy sort of way.

I've been wanting to scrap these photos forever (well, since last year)! They are from last summer when we drove to Montreal to visit my friend Melanie. Her kids and my kids instantly became friends. We were walking around Old Montreal, and Mel and I were trying to take photos of the boys. But they were having none of it.

My kids love taking photos. L-O-V-E. And the results aren't always bad. They don't have any preconceived idea of what is a good/bad photo. So they just shoot away. When I finally get the camera back, there are usually hundreds of photos, most of which are terribly blurry. But there are a few gems, as well. I made this layout with a little envelope to save those photo-gems. The idea for the title is from the If You Give A Mouse A Cookie book. While I was crafting it late one night, I looked at that stitched-on Sass paper, and thought it would be so clever of me to embroider a camera on the envelope. Har! I love the result, but it took me way more time than I care to admit. Embroidering is harder than it looks. (I'm sticking to knitting.)

And that is that for now. I must go back to my originally scheduled activity. Yeah. Running. Woot.

Thursday, August 5, 2010

The August Ella ezine, Ellaments, is out. And I have an article in it. An article about what I know well: boys! In it, there are some amazing, stereotype busting layouts by some of my boys-only mommy friends, Melanie Louette, Barb Wong, Séverine Di Giacomo, and Sarah Klemish. I was so lucky these gals agreed to do layouts for me in such short notice. Thank you ladies!

And in September, there will be an ebook from Ella called Ella’s Essential Guide to Scrapbooking Boys. I was so happy to be included in the book, alongside Kelly Goree, Wendy Smedley, Celeste Smith, and Georgana Hall. Together, we have 14 boys. Fourteen! Yeah. Makes me want to Febreeze the entire house, and then take a nap.